Each year the National Endowment for the Arts gathers new books to add to their NEA Big Read library, which is chock-full of titles sure to inspire fun opportunities and discussions for your community-wide reading programs. Today, the NEA Big Read committee announced six new books that will now be included, and we have three titles that made the list!

Today’s dedicated issue of Shelf Awareness gives a warm welcome to Celadon Books, Macmillan’s new imprint headed up by Jamie Raab and Deb Futter that will publish 20-24 books a year in fiction and nonfiction with commercial potential and literary merit, beginning in 2019. Their motto is “Celadon Books… Time Well Spent.”

Both Raab and Futter note that their “childhoods were steeped in use of their public libraries” and that Futter’s mother was a librarian for 50 years. Both grew up taking out a stack of books each week. They say, “We want both booksellers and librarians to know that we believe the best way to get a feel for our list is to read our books, and we’re happy to send you early copies. We also appreciate, and listen carefully to feedback, so would love to hear back from booksellers and librarians.”

Celadon’s First List:

Winter 2019

THE SILENT PATIENT by Alex Michaelides
Also available in audioAvailable February 5, 2019
A woman shoots her husband five times in the face, then never speaks another word. Theo Faber is the criminal psychotherapist who is determined to get her to talk….

THIS CHAIR ROCKS: A Manifesto Against Ageism by Ashton ApplewhiteAvailable March 5, 2019
Author, activist, and TED speaker Applewhite has written a rousing manifesto calling for an end to discrimination and prejudice on the basis of age.

WOLFPACK by Abby Wambach
Also available in audioAvailable April 16, 2019
Based on her inspiring 2018 Barnard commencement speech that went viral, WOLFPACK is soccer star Abby Wambach’s inspiring message to all women: support each other, knowing that the strength of the wolf is the pack.

CAPE MAY by Chip Cheek
Also available in audioAvailable April 30, 2019
A mesmerizing debut novel that explores the social and sexual mores of 1950s America through the eyes of a newly married couple from the genteel south corrupted by sophisticated New England urbanites. readmoreremove

Founded by publishing industry veterans Jamie Raab and Deb Futter, Celadon selects each title with thoughtful consideration in an effort to create a list that is at once classic, uncommon, and fosters discoverability of new voices. Their motto: “We believe that when readers finish a Celadon book, they will know that it was time well spent.” (They also have a gorgeous, amazingly curated website!)

THE SILENT PATIENT by Alex Michaelides
Also available in audioAvailable February 5, 2019
A woman shoots her husband five times in the face, then never speaks another word. Theo Faber is the criminal psychotherapist who is determined to get her to talk….

CAPE MAY by Chip Creek
Also available in audioAvailable April 30, 2019
A mesmerizing debut novel that explores the social and sexual mores of 1950s America through the eyes of a newly married couple from the genteel south corrupted by sophisticated New England urbanites.

Meanwhile over at School Library Journal‘s Day of Dialog, Melissa Albert (THE HAZEL WOOD) charmed on a “Strange Fascinations in YA” panel, and our own Emily Day presented her favorite forthcoming titles during a Publisher’s Pitch (we’re seeing Paris as a theme here…):

And at the LibraryReads Librarian author lunch, Suketu Mehta talked about his own experiences and research for his new book, THIS LAND IS THEIR LAND: An Impassioned Argument About Immigrations and Its Discontents (Spring 2019): “Fear of migrants is doing incalculably more damage than the migrants themselves ever could. All evidence shows that immigrants enrich the countries that they move to.”

Booklist hosted a live event with librarian book-group experts to talk about what makes a good selection, how to pick something unexpected for your group without causing a mass exodus, and lots and lots of suggestions for when you want to take your book group rogue. Check out their Macmillan recommendations:

BINTI by Nnedi Okorafor
Science fiction can be scary for book groups, but don’t be afraid, especially if Black Panther piqued your interest. BINTI is about space, sure, but it’s really about race and other meaty issues.

EVERFAIR by Nisi Shawl
Like BINTI, this is an Afro-futurist sci-fi book, plus steam punk and alternate history! So many genres. It will lead to discussions about prejudice, identity, colonialism, and even the structure of the story itself.

IF I WAS YOUR GIRL by Meredith Russo
Another YA book that adult book groups might poo-poo. It’s a teen love story, but the heroine is a trans girl who starts her senior year at a new school where she can be herself. If your book group members like to gain new understanding of people they might not (think they) encounter in real life, this is a great choice.

THE LONELY CITY by Olivia Laing
Pair with images of the artists discussed (Hopper, Warhol, Wojnarowicz); you can also talk about gentrification.

BAKING WITH KAFKA by Tom Gauld
A best-of collection of literary humour cartoons from the critically-acclaimed Guardian cartoonist. “The art is dominated by shadowy stick figures that inhabit often complex spaces, which somehow makes it all the more droll.” — Publishers Weekly

“Brooklyn-born Chast follows up her emotional National Book Award finalist memoir Can’t We Talk About Something More Pleasant with an expanded version of a guide to Manhattan she made for her college-bound daughter, which enlightens readers on the finer and sometimes obscure points of what makes New York City a vibrant and often loony landscape. Multiple aspects of the city are lovingly examined and lampooned, with a matter-of-fact intimacy that could only come from a native New Yorker, from the bad—why not to get on an empty subway car—to the grand—the expanses of Central Park. Observations and advice on making one’s way through the city’s diversions are mixed with the quirky character that oozes from the metropolis’s every concrete pore. It’s all delivered with obvious and knowing affection and captured with a keenly observant pen.”–Publishers Weekly, starred review

“Twenty years on, Fergus’ best-selling novel, One Thousand White Women (1998), remains vivid in readers’ memories and continues to be discovered by historical-fiction fans. He now continues the intriguing tale of the U.S. government’s controversial, little-publicized, assimilation-oriented Brides for Indians program… It’s a gripping tale, a history lesson infused with both sadness at the violence perpetuated against the Cheyenne and awe at the endurance of this remarkable group of women…Requests will be legion.”–Booklist, starred review

“National Book Award winner McDermott (Someone) delivers an immense, brilliant novel about the limits of faith, the power of sacrifice, and the cost of forgiveness…”–Publishers Weekly, starred + boxed review

“The cofounder of the sf website io9.com takes some of today’s key social and technical issues (the nature of artificial intelligence, the notion of property and ownership) and wraps them in a compelling, original story line acted out by memorable characters. VERDICT Lovers of original, thought-provoking sf should not miss this one.”–Library Journal, starred review